Russell T. Davies’ queer Channel 4 drama about “the radicalization of society” and how “the voices that were online are transferring into the real world” could have been written about many different minority groups today, the writer has said.
Davies’ Tip Toe spotlights the LGBTQIA+ experience in Manchester but he said the fears he is sharing in 2026 are not limited to the queer experience.
“A Jew could have written this,” Davies told the BBC’s Today. “If this was a Jewish version of the story you wouldn’t be calling it timely, you’d be calling it too late.” Davies was speaking a few weeks after two Jewish men were stabbed in North London in a terror attack and after multiple attacks on Jewish property, with the nation on high alert for more.
The same applies to the disabled community, the Doctor Who showrunner added. “I have had a friend in a wheelchair have someone knock on her door and tell her she’s lying, that she’s a benefit fraud, and that she can actually walk. That actually is physically happening in the world,” said Davies.
Davies was making the point that his show comes from a “queer lens” but is ultimately about “the war between two neighbors and the radicalization of society.”
Produced by Davies’ long-time collaborator Nicola Shindler, Tip Toe stars Alan Cumming and David Morrissey as a bar owner in Manchester and his long-standing neighbor, who become embroiled in a feud.
Davies said the show that reveals a “sliding back of gay rights” is all about how the terrors of the online world have become mainstream.
“Being online is a brand new form of communication that we did not evolve to suit,” he said. “We’re taking it so lightly and so much enjoying its benefits at the same time as we are actually sliding into hell.”
Davies said Channel 4 is happy for him to “sit back and be more radical” with the series, which follows his previous Channel 4 hit, It’s a Sin, about the Aids epidemic. Were it to have been made for the BBC, he said the corporation “insists” that he writes happy endings, such as for dystopian thriller Years & Years.
Tip Toe launches May 31 on Channel 4.
